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Mother’s day is usually celebrated the second Sunday in May. Today, however, the church commemorates the ultimate Mother, St. Mary, the Mother of Our Lord Christ. Mary has always had a special place in the hearts church members throughout the centuries. Whether she is venerated as remaining ever the virgin through an “Immaculate Conception,” or thought to have appeared at Lourdes or in various other times and places, or whether she is thought to be the “Queen of Heaven,” Mary remains Theotokos, the God-bearer. She was at the center of one of the greatest Christological crises in the history of the church. But no one can diminish the fact that she is the most blessed among women. And Mary never claimed anything more for herself, according to Scripture. She is mentioned just a handful of times in the Gospels in connection with the Birth of Christ, the Flight into Egypt, the Passover in the Temple, Jesus’ death, to name a few. Tradition holds that she followed John to Ephesus where she died. She is truly the things legends are made of for some say that she even was assumed bodily into heaven like Elijah, or Enoch. Yet Scripture does not bear witness to this speculation. And indeed, much of what we have about Mary in the traditions of the church are based on speculation and private revelation, like those matters noted above.

What we do have revealed in Holy Scripture, is the portrait of a true, earthly mother who brought her son, the God-man into this world, and watched Him leave it, hanging on a dreadful, bloody Cross. We are shown an example of true faith, faith that is bestowed upon us only by the Holy Spirit, in accepting the gift of bearing the salvation of the world inside of her, while secretly carrying in her heart her entire life with her Son the knowledge, the aching suspicion that, if the prophecies were true, if the sacrifices pointed to the Lamb of God, she held Him in her arms, and she would watch Him leave this world and this life. A blessing and a curse. Gospel and Law.

The Hail Mary

Many things have been written about Mary. The nicest come from Scripture. The Hail Mary, for example,as it is commonly known, is a prayer that developed over time in the church. It is taken from the Angel Gabriel’s greeting to Mary, as he announced to her the favor that God chose to bestow upon her to bear His Son into this world (Luke 1:28). The second part of the prayer is taken from the greeting Mary received from her cousin Elizabeth when her yet unborn child leapt in her womb in the presence of Mary and his God (Luke 1:42). These parts came into common use in the church by about 1050 AD according to the Catholic Encyclopedia. It was used as a salutation, greeting, or expression of honor to Mary, but not as a prayer. Read the rest of this entry →

I ran across this gem in Sunday’s readings from the Treasury of Daily Prayer from Concordia Publishing House. It is a quote from Martin Luther’s Introduction to the Book of Romans. Here Luther describes in as beautiful and as straightforward a manner what FAITH is. We tend to think of faith simply as belief or intellectual assent to divine truth. It is often described as something within us that is part of our nature, something we inherently possess. And yet that could not be farther from the truth of the matter.

Faith is not the human notion and dream that some people call faith. When they see that no improvement of life and no good works follow—although they can hear and say much about faith—they fall into the error of saying, “Faith is not enough; one must do works in order to be righteous and be saved.” This is due to the fact that when they hear the gospel, they get busy and by their own powers create an idea in their heart which says, “I believe”; they take this then to be a true faith. But, as it is a human figment and idea that never reaches the depths of the heart, nothing comes of it either, and no improvement follows.

The Reformation of the Church, ignited in 1517 by Martin Luther’s posting of the Theses on Indulgences, is and always has been about the proclamation of the pure Gospel as set forth in sacred Scripture. The “Treasury of Daily Prayer,” from Concordia Publishing House had as part of the readings for today a paragraph from Martin Luther’s sermon on John 1:29 – Behold the Lamb of God. The pure Gospel, as Lutherans and orthodox Christendom proclaims it – we have strayed from time to time from this proclamation – is and always has been Christ and Him crucified for our sins and raised for our justification. It is not an intellectual concept that can be grasped by man with his own faculties. Instead it is something that can only be received by faith, for faith, through faith. For Christ draws us into His story of the cross. His story becomes our story. His life, our life. His death, our death. His resurrection, ours too. His freedom, our freedom. For if the Son makes you free, you are free indeed. It is our eternal hope, and a promise to which must cling. It is Christ Himself.

I give thanks to God for the faithful who have gone before us to pave the way for the freedom we have in Christ. He gives His saints the courage to stand before kings and princes, in the face of great persecution to bear witness to the hope we have in Christ. I give thanks to God that He used Martin Luther “to hatch the egg that Erasmus laid,” and I pray that you do too. If you have not read any of Luther’s sermons, you should. Do not form your opinions of Lutherans on any crass opinions you have heard about Luther’s physical infirmities, or other fantastic insights into his psyche. Instead, read what he has to say for he points to Christ.

In the Sermon on John 1:29, Luther reflects on John’s proclamation of the Christ who approached the river Jordan to be baptized: “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” Here Luther gives the Gospel, the pure Gospel proclamation of Christ:

May you ever cherish and treasure this thought. Christ is made a servant of sin, yea, a bearer of sin, and the lowliest and most despised person. He destroys all sin by Himself and says: “I came not to be served but to serve” (Matt. 20:28). There is no greater bondage than that of sin; and there is no greater service than that displayed by the Son of God, who becomes the servant of all, no matter how poor, wretched, or despised they may be, and bears their sins. It would be spectacular and amazing, prompting all the world to open ears and eyes, mouth and nose in uncomprehending wonderment, if some king’s son were to appear in a beggar’s home to nurse him in his illness, wash off his filth, and do everything else the beggar would have to do. Would this not be profound humility? Any spectator or any beneficiary of this honor would feel impelled to admit that he had seen or experienced something unusual and extraordinary, something magnificent. But what is a king or an emperor compared with the Son of God? Furthermore, what is a beggar’s filth or stench compared with the filth of sin which is ours by nature, stinking a hundred thousand times worse and looking infinitely more repulsive to God than any foul matter found in a hospital? And yet the love of the Son of God for us is of such magnitude that the greater the filth and stench of our sins, the more He befriends us, the more He cleanses us, relieving us of all our misery and of the burden of all our sins and placing them upon His own back. All the holiness of the monks stinks in comparison with this service of Christ, the fact that the beloved Lamb, the great Man, yes, the Son of the Exalted Majesty, descends from heaven to serve me.

Such benefactions of God might well provoke us to love and to laud God and to celebrate this service in song and sermon and speech. It should also induce us to die willingly and to remain cheerful in all suffering. For how amazing it is that the Son of God becomes my servant, that He humbles Himself so, that He cumbers Himself with my misery and sin, yes, with the sin and the death of the entire world! He says to me: “You are no longer a sinner, but I am. I am your substitute. You have not sinned, but I have. The entire world is in sin. However, you are not in sin; but I am. All your sins are to rest on Me and not on you.” No one can comprehend this. In yonder life our eyes will feast forever on this love of God. And who would not gladly die for Christ’s sake? The Son of Man performs the basest and filthiest work. He does not don some beggar’s torn garment or old trousers, nor does He wash us as a mother washes a child; but He bears our sin, death, and hell, our misery of body and soul. Whenever the devil declares: “You are a sinner!” Christ interposes: “I will reverse the order; I will be a sinner, and you are to go scotfree.” Who can thank our God enough for this mercy?